It may seem hackneyed to describe a film as unlike anything you’ve seen before- but you’re going to have to trust me on this one. Evolution is Lucile Hadžihalilović’s second feature film. The French writer and director was the winner of the prestigious Bronze Horse award at the Stockholm International Film Festival for her first feature, Innocence (2004). I met with Hadžihalilović while she was in Dublin for the premiere of Evolution, at the Dublin International Film Festival in February.

The film tells the story of ten year old Nicolas (Max Brebant) who is living in an isolated seaside community consisting solely of women and little boys. The boys are all subjected to unsettling and unexplained treatments by severe nurses, and only Nicolas seems to question what is happening to them. What unfolds is a disturbing and unforgettable nightmare about a primitive kind of reproduction. The immersive film, which was shot in Lanzarote, features striking shots of the dry, volcanic landscape and colourful underwater scenes. Hadžihalilović chose this Mediterranean location as its dark landscape and grey skies stand at odds with preconceptions of the south. So, too, does her cast: “I wanted them to be attractive, but also strange,” the director explains, describing the women as “some kind of beings which are not quite human”. Indeed, her female leads Roxanne Duran and Julie-Marie Parmentier, with their distinctively pale skin, possess an austere beauty which doesn’t quite fit with the location. Hadžihalilović’s deliberate refusal of conventions creates a space which is at once realistic and decidedly surreal. Even the juxtaposition of the clinical hospital environment and the lush ocean scenes is not a simple one, as Hadžihalilović is quick to emphasise. Although the sea may appear to be a lost paradise full of wonder, it also holds a sense of unexpressed threat. The hospital, too, seems quite normal at the beginning but soon becomes more phantasmagorical. As the film advances, its procedures take place below ground and the sea begins to assert its presence.

“I used to say [Evolution] was autobiographical,” the director reveals. Evidently seeing my look of alarm, she goes on to explain that it is reminiscent of her own fears as a preteen when she developed appendicitis and was subject to a routine operation. She remembers how strange it was to have been restrained by adults “who open your body and take out a part of it…and you’re not really sure what’s happening”. It is this prospect of the unknown which disturbed her the most. In the film, it is the boys’ future that is unknown- there are no adult males present on the island and they don’t know what they will become. The question of pregnancy, too, is depicted as something mysterious and frightening. I ask if the film, by displacing these fears onto young boys rather than young girls, making a comment about gender roles? Hadžihalilović doesn’t think so, exactly: “it’s more about the fear of growing up and changing,” she asserts. The children in the film are on the verge of adolescence, and faced with the prospect of their bodies changing without their control. She believes this is a discomforting time for all children, regardless of their gender. The director does remark that there is a lack of “serious” films about boys growing up, while there are a lot more about girls – indeed Innocence is a case in point.

Evolution avoids the usual crude horror tropes, in favour of an uneasy atmosphere that makes it is clear something is not quite right. Hadžihalilović conceived of the film “much more like a dream, a nightmare”; a reflection of Nicolas’ mind. The soundtrack, which features real sounds of the sea, is far from the usual screeching violins of horror films. Instead, it hauntingly expresses the feelings and emotions of the boy. The cinematography, too, is otherworldly and dream-like. An image of the starfish continually reoccurs – just as it would in a dream. Familiar images, such as children playing on the beach, become something uncanny when set in this strange world where the children are disturbingly blank and serious. When Nicolas is invited to draw, he doesn’t use his imagination as a normal child his age would, but instead draws consistently realistic objects- “as if there was a realistic world somewhere else which he knew, something beyond”. The children are so “cold and stiff”, Hadžihalilović explains, because “they belong to the nightmare”.

How did the young cast respond to such an eerie film? “Max read the script and had two questions,” Hadžihalilović replies with a smile. “First, he wanted to know if he was going to have a real injection. And second, he wanted to know who was going to play the girl” (the nurse Stella, with whom he manages to share some kind of human sentiment). In a way, it was this aspect which was the most challenging for the thirteen year old “and he was probably right, the film is a lot about that too”. The other children, who were aged between nine and eleven, found it very funny to be involved in the making of such a serious film, looking back on the disconcerting feature as “memories of a holiday”. Hadžihalilović believes that they are too young to fully appreciate it now, suggesting that “maybe in a few years, if they see it again, they’ll be able to see more of it”. Even for an adult audience, the film is so richly nuanced that a second viewing would prove enriching. The ending, for example, cannot be seen as any kind of clear resolution. Hadžihalilović stresses that the film showcases one moment in Nicolas’ life, with the ending marking the beginning of a new challenge. “It’s another step,” she explains, before adding “so now I can maybe do a sequel!”

Evolution will be out in cinemas from May 6th.